When Harry meets older Dahlia, he realizes that she's his wife. But she never says that she's Dahla, nor does Harry say it. (And you have to admit, that it doesn't look like Dahlia sometimes. I've had all 3, and the one where she's nearly bald [On the Wiki, this is Tomboy Dahlia] looks almost NOTHING like her.) So, is this a plot hole or something? I mean, how did he link Dahlia with Wife?

(My possible theory [spoiler]is that Cheryl already linked the two, considering the whole game is her delusion.)[/spoiler]

He doesn't automatically link it; after she freezes he pauses and touches her face and looks at her closely. I could see the resemblance. I think she looks quite similar if you look closely. Her voice is also a give away. He calls that house earlier and asks for Cheryl and the lady on the phone responds, "No, Dahlia..." but shortly thereafter hangs up on him. I don't think it's too much of a stretch that he expected a woman named Dahlia, the woman who he spoke to on the phone, to be there, and made the connection to young Dahlia based on appearance and, maybe clothing.

Isn't younger Dahlia supposed to be Cheryl projecting herself as her mother? I would suppose that's why they really don't look alike. Older Dahlia is most likely just her vilified way of looking at her mother.

Because the blond lady slapping Harry around at the end is the way his real wife, the real Dahlia looked. The ones you see during the game, both young and old, are projections created by Cheryl. She is essentially projecting herself onto her mother's identity as both a means of creating parents who were a loving happy couple and fulfilling what appears to be an Electra complex.

There does seem to be a slight issue with this in the game. During that scene where you first meet older Dahlia, there is a version of it where her name never comes up. You learn that this is Harry's wife but no name is mentioned and nothing to connect her to younger Dahlia. Then only later in the gane (depending on what happens) Harry will say to younger Dahlia that he met somebody twice her age with the same name.

This is how it happened for me in my first and third playthroughs. So, the first time, I had no idea (and no way of knowing) for most of the game that the older lady was also Dahlia.

Sometimes that sort of mental dissociation comes up. In some conversations, Lisa also asks "So tell me about your daughter" when Harry never mentioned having one. They're all hints that none of these characters are real, and the scenario only makes as much sense as Cheryl's shattered mind.

Aura's right. If you really pay attention to the conversations, stuff like that happens throughout the entire game. Even on random phone calls you can make.

A bit of an aside, but probably my favorite example was calling the Toluca Mall security dude. He starts the conversation by saying that the mall is closed and they don't do security there anymore, and then ends the conversation by calling BS on Harry because Harry didn't trip any of the security alarms and because he's not showing up on the security cameras.

Anyway, I've never had older Dahlia tell me her name when Harry meets her, but you don't need her to say that to figure out who she is, considering young Dahlia is the only character who explicitly connects herself in a romantic way to Harry. Even when I played through the game with an audience, no one had trouble picking that up.

I completely disagree that older Dahlia is an "Ew, my mother is gross and I hate her" idea for one reason: when you first meet her in the bedroom and Harry demands to know who she is she replies (at least every time I've played) "We're soulmates you and I...for better or worse, for richer or poorer.." (please correct me if my quote is a little off). Harry takes that to mean she's his wife and then she freezes.

From everything I remember, the icy nightmare takes over whenever Harry is getting too close to the truth. For instance both times Cybil confronts him about his identity it does not let her finish telling him. I believe the world ices over at that moment because Dahlia cannot answer Harry. She is not his wife, but she is is soulmate... Cheryl's still projecting onto her.

I see a clear resemblance between young Dahlia and older Dahlia, but that's just me. I don't think I was clear. I don't believe that older Dahlia is a self-projection, but I think the fact that she is so directly linked to young Dahlia, who is, could be a hybridization of the two. Two birds with one stone thing.